"And Grantaire, after this fit of eloquence, had a fit of coughing, which he deserved." - Victor Hugo, Les Misérables

Friday, June 3, 2011

The Three Realms

This is based off something Mar, Mir, and I came up with at recess today. We developed it a bit, so I wrote a short story thing about it. I have no clue why it's in second person. I just had the random urge to do that.____________________________________________________________________________

If you climb down the north cliffs of Blogland, you will soon reach a cave. Don’t be afraid, dear traveler. Enter the cave. You are much safer there than hanging on the side of a cliff. And you are certainly protected from the strange lands on the other side.

But still, do not fear. Go through the dark of the cave. Keep straight. Any turns are there to confuse and dishearten you, but do not fall for the tricks of the three masters. You must have courage. They admire that.

Alas! You travel for what seems to be hours, but that is not the case, as time moves itself along slower in here. Eventually, you see a light. Do not be foolish. Do not run towards the light. Ignore the tug in your gut and the longing filling you. Walk calmly towards the light, and step carefully onto the small ledge outside of the cave.

The harsh sunlight is blinding, but your eyes quickly adjust. Then you gasp, for in the distance is the most beautiful thing! A large, dimly glowing glass dome, surrounding a city. Oh, how beautiful it is! The buildings shine and the sky is a lovely blue. It shimmers and flickers like a mirage, but you feel that it is most certainly real! The buildings remain the same, but the scenery seems to be changing. At one point as you gaze at it, mesmerized, the dome fills with water, but quickly empties, and a rainbow stretches across the sky, where the sun hangs gloriously. You know right then that you must reach this gorgeous place. You must.

But then something else catches your eye. Something far less beautiful. Something that makes your heart stop for a moment. In terror.

Between you and your destination lies a disturbing land that stretches for miles. To the west lies a desert. Not the already deadly kind you’ve seen on TV and maybe in person. Oh no, this is much more terrifying. The sands are a dark maroon, a color that looks like blood has stained the land. Sandstorms rage constantly, and here another sun hangs low in the sky, reddening the sky, casting a sinister glow over everything.

You turn to the east, hoping for a more friendly sight, but to no avail. Here is the jungle, which makes a perfect half circle, the other half of the desert. It is wild, crazy, tangled place. The trees green leaves seem pale and dull, sickly even. Vines and gnarled trunks can be seen from your vantage point. As you watch, a piercing cry, somewhere between a howl and a snarl can be heard from the forest. Your ears ring. You glance around fervently for the dome from earlier, but you cannot find it. Just as you verge on a panic attack, your eyes pick out the glowing haven. But how far away it seems! Certainly you were closer earlier?

But now the landscape has changed again. Now the desert and jungle ring lies behind you, and you are closer to the dome. But still something is in your way.

There is no sun in this ring of the land. Not at all. The sky is a dark, gloomy gray, and the land is no better. It is worse, in fact. The entire place seems to have been ravaged by an explosion. The hard packed ground in charred and black. Here and there, chunks of rock and gnarled, stooped, burnt remains of trees dot the land. In your mind flash images of a raging fire, the bright light of an explosion, the shadows of the long forgotten. Death reigns here.

‘You’re being paranoid.’

You whirl around, trying to find the speaker. Your stomach lurches as you realizes something. The entrance to the cave is far off in the distance, and the ledge of rock you are standing on is floating in midair. But there is no one else. No living things about.

‘There is plenty of life here, but you’re just not looking hard enough. And we promise you, no one has ever died here. These lands are designed to make you think of death. But seriously, do you think we’d go around killing innocent people to make a place like this? Pfft, heck no! We found it like this. Well, there was a lot of exploding things and renovations done in the middle two rings, but other than that, it’s all natural! “Death reigns here”? Please. Why would we kill our friends?’

Now you realize that there are three voices, not one, speaking to you. And the three voices are not what you expected. They were in your head, and were the voices of girls. Girls who were laughing at you. Not only that, but you recognized the voices.

The voices belonged to your friends Mirtil Lucifer, March Pathway, and Thalia Circe. You could almost see their grinning faces.

‘Just throwing this out there,’ the trio said, ‘but we like to called this place The Three Realms. We couldn’t think of anything better. Also….um, our, uh….let’s call them our pets, shall we? Yeah, our pets. They don’t listen too well. They’ll probably hurt you. Well, no, not probably. They will hurt you. But they don’t kill, and we can heal you when you get to the oasis. Okay? Yes? Good. Bye now.’

You raised an eyebrow, but somehow it didn’t surprise that this trio of lunatics had found such a weird and disturbing place. And somehow, you also knew that even though you had been informed that no one had died here and that you wouldn’t be the first, it wouldn’t stop you from panicking and feeling very afraid once you got onto the land. It was probably another thing the land was designed to make you do. Feel fear. Just to give the owners a few good laughs.

Because you seriously believed that they were watching you on a big TV screen right now.

And they were laughing.

And Thalia was yammering your thoughts to them nonstop right now.

Shaking your head, you took in the landscape once more. Two staircases were now spiraling down from your little slab of rock. One led to the desert, and one to the jungle. So the girls were only making you journey through one of the two? Maybe they did have a sense of mercy after all.

Or maybe they would send all their “pets” from the one you didn’t choose over to the other side. Just to give you a hard time.

You kicked those thoughts out of your mind and did a quick mental recap of all you had to go through.

Mir’s jungle and forest. Only that crazy chibi demon would be capable of ruling over such an insane land. Either place, forest or jungle, would suck big time. Because Mir loved laughing at tortured people’s faces.

Thalia’s…territory. You had no idea what else to call it. But you were certain that she had done more than her fair share of blowing things up in that stretch of barren landscape, and had undoubtedly left some paint and flash bombs behind. Maybe even some real bombs.

And lastly, the one safe haven, Mar’s oasis. It seemed pretty awesome there, from what you had seen. That was definitely where the trio was lounging about right now. In the back of your mind, you vaguely wondered if Mar had built statues of frying pans there. Probably.

You sighed, and then squared your shoulders. You would get to Mar’s oasis.

And then you would smack all three girls upside the head.

You took your choice of staircase and started down. Somehow, you knew that once you got to the oasis, Mar, Mir, and Thalia would be waiting at the entrance to welcome you with tea and cookies.

I find it so amusing how my writing went from all serious to my normal weird style. I totally didn't intend to do that. Woot. I'm not sure if I'll continue it. I think that if I do, I'll make little short stories depicting the journeys of everyone's OC's through our domains. Only if anyone wants me to, though. And then I might do a little short of Mar, Mir, and Thalia laughing at people while they struggle. Heh.